Printmaking is such a fun medium to teach to elementary students. I try to do at least one lesson in block printing per year and it typically ends up being the favorite/most memorable for the kids.
I thought I’d go out on a limb with the fourth-graders and teach them how to do a reduction print of a sea animal. Before we began, however, I demonstrated the concept of a mirror image by having one of the students stand facing me and mirror my movements. We discussed how when I move my right hand, the student moved her left hand and vice versa. The point I tried to make was that when carving a block for printmaking (in our case, styrofoam), the resulting print will be a mirror image of that carving.
Here’s a brief explanation of the project:
Carve simple outline of sea creature.
Apply ink evenly using a brayer.
Press foam sheet face down on paper to make a print.
Carve details into foam and cut out sea creature.
Apply black ink to foam and place carefully face down on original print.
Press, remove and voila! Reduction print.
Below is the slideshow (Powerpoint) I used to introduce the project to the students. Feel free to use and adjust it to meet the needs of your classroom.
Every time we moms are out in public with our littles we hear it from older parents.
“They grow up SO fast.” “Cherish this time.” “They won’t stay little forever.”
Beneath a strained smile, we brush off the comment as patronizing. We roll our eyes to ourselves, convinced that this phase will never end. The sleep deprivation, the babes weighing down our arms, the constant messes, the power struggles, the depleted sense of “self”.
To be sure, the baby/toddler/preschooler phase can wear down the best of us.
But you know what?
The old ladies are right. One day I was stuffing four little bodies into a Costco cart and the next I was sending the youngest of them off to kindergarten.
One day I counted down the hours until my husband came home from work and the next I was so busy shuttling my school-age children around that I was surprised at how early he walked in the door.
One day I was battling the two-year-old tantrums and the next I was helping one of my daughters grapple with teenage depression.
One day I was arranging play dates left and right and the next I was hosting 10-12 girls for a Halloween party that my daughter had planned and prepared entirely by herself.
One day I was whipping up macaroni and cheese for the kids on a regular basis and the next day they were whipping it up so that Tim and I could go out for dinner.
One day they went from this:
To this:
Overnight.
I’d like to think I followed the advice of more experienced moms and enjoyed those earlier days. I did my best to not shrug off the comments at the grocery store about how short this time is. I gave it my best shot.
It didn’t make the time slow down any. Lucky for me, though, I get another chance at this stage of life. Four years ago when I found out I had a viable pregnancy almost seven years after the last one, I pretty much laughed out loud. Pushing the reset button at the ripe old age of 38 was never part of the plan.
Fortunately, for me, a mother of advanced age, I had the perspective I didn’t have the first time around (try though I did to cultivate it). “They grow up SO fast.” “Cherish this time.” “They won’t stay little forever.”
Consequently, raising little Jack has been an absolute joy. Sure, I am older, and even more exhausted than the first time around. But I’m wiser, too. Wise enough to know that I’m going to miss this someday.
We would all do well to remind ourselves of that fact, in every stage of life. “I’m going to miss this someday”.
I may not love that I have to accompany my teenage daughter every single time she gets behind the wheel of a car until she gets her license. But I can have the foresight that when she does, I’m going to miss the hours we got to spend one-on-one in the car during those critical teenage years.
Planning birthday parties for my ten-year-old may tax my creativity (and wallet) but I may miss the day that she valued my input on her activities.
I may be exasperated that every waking hour encompasses meeting the needs of each of my five children but I will likely long for that sense of purpose behind my life and activities when those kiddos are up and out.
It’s good to look to the future with hope and anticipation. It’s also beneficial to recognize the possibility that our current circumstances are equally worthy of enjoyment. That in hindsight, we might actually miss the moments we are living right now.
But the question is, how?
Remember when you were almost due with your first child and all the older moms told you to “sleep when the baby sleeps”? I do. You know what’s great about sleeping when the baby sleeps (within reason, because, as we all know, it isn’t realistic to sleep 15 plus hours a day)? You can give your best, well-rested self to your child during their waking hours. And you’ll enjoy each moment a lot more when you’re not constantly nodding off during play time. Try napping when your kid does. It might surprise you how much your life and energy improve.
When my babes were little, a more experienced mom told me that at the end of every night, she would sneak into her kids’ bedrooms and watch them sleep for a moment. Let’s face it, kids are adorable when they sleep. The sight of their angelic little faces reawakens that sense of love and gratitude for the opportunity to be their mother, despite the challenges of the day. Try it out.
Write it down. I started a blog when my oldest was four years old (I had three kids at the time). Had I not, I would never remember that she had asked me to rename her “Cinderella”. Or that her younger sister had swallowed a penny. I certainly wouldn’t remember that all of my children managed to climb out on the roof one night. Scratch that. You don’t forget stuff like that. Point is, reading about those early parenting days is a whole lot more enjoyable than living them. So keep a record.
“They grow up SO fast.” The old ladies are right. So let’s quit rolling our eyes and enjoy those little ones.
Yes, I realize that to some, this idea might seem foolish. After all, entropy exists in all spaces that kids inhabit. Messes and children are practically synonymous.
However, it IS possible to keep a clean house that houses children without hiring a housekeeper (or doing it all yourself). I promise. I have five little (and not so little) munchkins. I gave up dreams of a perfect house long ago – but I can also assure you that my house ranks reasonably high in the “tidy” factor.
How do I do it? Why slave labor, of course. (At least that’s what my kids might call it). I refer to it as “earning your keep”. Nothing comes for free in this house.
Sure, I’m obligated to feed, clothe, love and teach you, and part of that teaching demands that you learn to clean up after yourselves. I’ve blogged about it before. As a review, the basic rundown is this:
Self-maintenance chores: These include tidying your own spaces (bedroom, primarily), picking up after yourself in common areas, and other such things that are age-appropriate such as packing your own lunch for school, brushing your teeth, doing laundry, etc. As a child gets older, self-maintenance chores increase in number, as do his/her privileges. My kids are not paid for these chores – they are regarded as an opportunity to learn independence.
Family chores: These are responsibilities outlined on a chore chart. They benefit the entire family and apply to spaces occupied/used by everyone in the family. They include things like cleaning bathrooms, vacuuming, dusting, etc. I break them down into smaller tasks to trick their minds into thinking they’re doing less work. And it works! Though the kids don’t earn money for each specific chore, their “allowance” is contingent upon satisfactory completion of them on a weekly basis.
Paid chores: I assign these on an as-needed basis. I pretty much always have extra work available, if the kids want to earn a little cash on the side. My personal favorites (in other words, the chores I tend to neglect): sorting socks, shredding paper bills and statements, cleaning windows, and dusting blinds.
Since we added an extra 700 square feet onto our house in 2018, Tim and I determined that we needed to reconfigure our chore chart a bit to accommodate the extra space. (And to keep me from having to do the legwork). Because, hello, I am a homemaker, not everyone’s personal maid.
Here’s the new chore chart.
It looks about the same as the old chore chart (to trick the kiddos into thinking nothing has changed, of course) but it accounts for the new bathroom, the extra living space downstairs, and the bonus room.
We do all these chores on a Friday afternoon, and, I kid you not, each of my daughters only has to do about 30-45 minutes of work (in addition to cleaning their rooms) and the house is immaculate. Almost.
Seriously, don’t hire a housekeeper. Put those kids to work. It’s their house, too. They need to feel some ownership and responsibility. That is best accomplished with good old-fashioned elbow grease.
2018 was replete with highs and lows. Some more obvious – like our remodel, which was a major low, though we are finally beginning to enjoy the benefits of it. An obvious high – our amazing trip to the east coast this summer.
Other highs and lows we keep close to the heart – too private to broadcast to the world. It’s safe to say that lows are part of the human experience, though Instagram would have us believe otherwise. To be sure, 2018 presented its fair share of heartache and joy.
I would be remiss in putting the year behind me without recording a few poignant lessons learned in the process.
Toddlers and teenagers are one and the same. Except one is much cuter than the other. Thankfully for my children, I love them both.
The scriptures continue to be my lifeline. Where would I be without a constant source of truth to pour into my soul to combat the myriad of opinions that bombard from all sides? I am grateful to have them to ground me and remind me what is real and most important.
Relationships must be nurtured if we want them to last.
Stress and weight gain go hand in hand.
The benefits of family meal-time are plentiful and well-documented.
Experiences are more valuable than things.
To add to that, things are only valuable if they facilitate experiences, particularly those that involve building relationships.
I loveneed naps.
I learned some of these lessons in very painful ways. 2018 was rough. But it could have been worse. One thing for which I am grateful is the perspective that our rough days (months, years) can work together for our good. I am determined to use the stumblings of 2018 for my benefit (while secretly hoping I don’t have to repeat those experiences. Ever again.)
2018 was an “off” year for us. The remodel did not bring out the best in each of us. When December rolled around and we still were parking our cars in the driveway because contractors were using our garage as a makeshift workshop I was at my wits end.
We spent the better part of November and December paying sub-contractors because our general contractor failed to do so. The house was freezing cold as our new contractors wrapped up the finishing touches. We didn’t even put up the Christmas tree until less than a week before Christmas.
As per usual, a couple of strands of white lights had burned out and I couldn’t spare the time to go buy more. We made do with red ones at the top of the tree. When Christmas Eve rolled around and we still hadn’t put ornaments on the tree, we called it good and went without. Needless to say, the holiday spirit was in short supply at our house.
Still, old habits die hard and we managed to whip up goodies for neighbors and friends.
I mean, who wouldn’t want to bake with this cutie around to wash dishes for you?
We attended several choir and band Christmas concerts, piano recitals and even caroled at our local retirement home with Jack’s Joy School class (and their families).
This year, I fulfilled a dream of mine to rope my girls into singing an SSAA arrangement of a Christmas song with me. I selected a jazzy rendition of I’ll Be Home for Christmas, and I have to say, we killed it.
Four parts and everyone nailed it. It’s so fun to have musicians in the family. Now I have to get them to do it year-round.
My parents and two youngest siblings joined us for a few days. We cooked, ate, played games, watched movies, danced and had a marvelous time. Despite our delayed jump into the season, Christmas can’t help but being wonderful.
Paul Gauguin is such a downer to teach elementary students. They love success. They want to hear about artists who made a name for themselves while still living.
No such luck when studying Gauguin. He died sad and penniless, with nary a credit to his name. Well, he’s certainly made his mark now. Definitely an artist worth studying – and plenty of fodder for elementary art projects to boot.
I thought the fourth-graders would enjoy a stint using liquid watercolors. In my mind, the vibrancy of color they provide most closely matches the colors used in Gauguin’s paintings.
As always, I wanted to include an art principle, so despite the flatness and minimal perspective used in Gauguin’s works, I taught them about fore, middle and background, loosely using his Tahitian Landscape as a model.
Draw a simple background lightly in pencil.
Add a few things in the middle ground.
Draw at least one large object in the foreground.
Outline your entire drawing in black sharpie.
Add liquid watercolor to all white space, using colors one would not expect.
Here’s the slideshow I used to instruct the class on Paul Gauguin and to explain the steps of the project:
We’ve officially entered birthday season at our house. One birthday per month until April. (Tim is the outlier in September). Rachel kicks it off in November.
On even years, the kids get to celebrate with friends so Rachel opted to invite a gaggle of girls to dinner at Panda Express and roller skating in Nampa. It was a blast. And we walked away with about 20 B1G1 coupons so we’ll be back for more…on Lily’s birthday!
As a side note, can I just say how much I love small towns? (I’m speaking of Nampa). Don’t get me wrong, I love living within 15 minutes of convenience and culture, but there’s something so refreshing about a small town environment. The people are a wee bit friendlier, in my opinion.
Moving on… Rachel has looked like a twelve-year-old for like two years now so this birthday shouldn’t have surprised me. But it did. For all intents and purposes, I now have three teenagers in the house. Three teenage girls, no less.
One of our birthday traditions is to shower the birthday girl (or boy) with compliments as we devour cake and ice cream together. There isn’t enough good to say about Rachel. She’s fun, helpful, obedient, responsible, inquisitive, problem-solving, and simply lovely.
We made a red velvet cake for her party and a peanut butter chocolate cheesecake for the family celebration. I’m a sucker for elaborate, from-scratch dessert requests. And they turn out spectacularly, if I do say so myself.
Earlier in the month primarily consisted of Rachel’s school basketball team’s tournament. They did well, despite having more fifth than sixth graders on their team. They went down in the third round when they played the team that ultimately went to the championship (before losing).
She also auditioned for and was one of the leads in the school play. She auditioned on Monday, memorized an abominable number of lines in 3 days and performed on Friday.
Eve also auditioned and was cast in the opening act, where she got to jam to Greatest Showman tunes and practice the back walkover she had recently mastered. We were proud of them both.
We spent Thanksgiving in Utah with family. My parents had recently accepted an offer on their home of over four years so it was a sort of “last hurrah” at the home my girls had known as grandma and grandpa’s house for a decent chunk of their working memory.
Good food, great company, fun games and gingerbread houses as usual.
We took pictures in front of it before leaving, of course.
We arrived home just in time for me to take Eve downtown to the Festival of Trees. She had entered an elementary art contest and received a top ten prize. Her drawing was on display so she indulged me in a picture or two in front of it. A mom can be proud, right?
Rachel dominated my November post, but we’ll just chalk it up to being the birthday girl.
As one can probably tell from my infrequent posts of late, I’ve been preoccupied with none other than our never ending remodel saga. Frankly, I just want my life back. It’s been six months. It was supposed to take two. Yes, I was realistic enough to know that it would inevitably take longer. But not THIS much longer.
So here I am, living life without a master bedroom door for the 181st day. Five children. No master bedroom door. Think about that.
When I complain about our remodel experience, I feel a little guilty. I acknowledge that the inconveniences we’ve endured are truly first world problems.
Still, for the sake of journaling, I want to document some of the things I’ve come to appreciate more deeply in my current state of perceived deprivation.
Privacy. This goes without saying. I miss being able to use the restroom without hearing our contractor call out my name. I want to do laundry without worrying about someone catching glimpses of our piles of underwear. I want to be able to leave my house without wondering if someone will start thumbing through drawers. I assume they want to be professional, but it simply gives me the creeps opening up my home to total strangers.
Naps. Without a bedroom door, it’s safe to say that my regular power nap has pretty much gone out the window. Along with my even temper and my mental health. (And if I even hear you working parents mention how spoiled I was to get one in the first place, I just might clock you. See what I mean?) Those 20 minutes of shut-eye every few days may have saved my life on more than one occasion. Not to mention my kids’ lives.
Temperature Control. When we came home at the end of July to a barely-framed addition with only recently-installed windows, the temperature in our house was 88 degrees. With the air conditioner running all day long. It’s now November, and, while redoing those same doors and windows that were not installed properly the first time, we have the opposite problem.
Friends. It’s safe to say most friendships are not one-sided. So imagine how detrimental it might be to those friendships when you can’t invite them over. Ever. For six months. Because you live in a freaking construction zone. Our friends (and our kids’ friends) have been more than accommodating but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel slightly disconnected from our usual social circles.
As the saying goes, “absence makes the heart grow fonder”. I can personally attest to an increased affection for things I previously took for granted. I have the remodel to thank for that. If nothing else.
We kicked off October with Joy School at our house. Except that the condition of our home provided less than ideal circumstances for 2 1/2 hours of access to preschoolers. So we scheduled a field trip and called it good. Keeping 4 two and three year-olds from running off in different directions at all times was no small task. I whipped out my very best bribery techniques and somehow we all survived.
Monday night Anna participated in and won third place in a barbershop competition. Their quartet walked away with $300 in prize money. Not to shabby for forming a week earlier and, therefore, having minimal practice time.
We scheduled hardwood installation early in the month and we’re “kicked out” of our house for two days while the fumes of the finish died down. We made it a long weekend by pulling the girls out of school on Thursday and Friday and heading down to visit family in Utah.
We then had a few days before carpet installation began that Friday. They completed half the carpeting. Then we spent the weekend shifting furniture into newly recarpeted rooms so they could do the rest on Monday.
Sunday night I received word that my parents were getting a divorce. (Just shy of 45 years of marriage). Still processing that one.
Monday morning’s carpet installation coincided with Jack’s regular infusions (3 consecutive days) which also coincided with Tim scheduling our phones to get their batteries replaced.
So, we had workers at our house while I was stuck at the hospital without a phone. For three days. And honestly. It could not have gone more smoothly.
Did you catch that? I survived mothering five children ages 3-15 for four days without a phone.
On the down side, without a phone, I didn’t have a camera with which to take Jack’s pic with the frog at the infusion center. Ah, nuts. Here’s the last one, for old times’ sake.
Can I just say how luxurious carpet feels when you’ve been walking around on sub-floors for over two months? Rachel loved it so much she ditched her bed to sleep on the floor of her newly-carpeted bedroom the first night.
The flooring was the big project of the month but we also installed bathroom and light fixtures, got siding and a roof (but not before 2 inches of rainfall in a single day, and a resulting leak into the new bathroom).
Our house still looks rather unfinished, as the columns in the downstairs living area are…well, unfinished. We told our contractor that we’d be hiring someone else to do those. After seeing his lack of attention to detail on other aspects of the remodel we called it quits and are looking for someone else to the trim work. Wish us luck.
Rachel played basketball at her elementary and pretty much towered over every opponent. Except one. It was very frustrating to have someone a full head taller than her but I hope it gave her a bit of perspective on how others feel when she’s in the game. She makes basketball look easy.
Both Anna and Lily had choir concerts…on the same night. I took the kids to the high school for Anna’s and Tim had Lily duty. Anna sang a solo in her jazz choir and nailed it. That girl was made to sing. Such a smooth tone and perfect pitch. Proud momma moment, for sure. Sadly, I didn’t get any pictures of the occasion because I spent all my energy wrangling the toddler in my lap. Sorry Anna. Luckily we got to watch footage on Twitter with Tim and Lily later that night.
The fall colors stun all around. Raking just might be one of my favorite chores. Especially when there’s company. It never ceases to amaze me how intuitive it is for kids to jump in a freshly-raked pile of leaves.
The elementary school held their annual Monster Mash over a week before Halloween. Here are our “Glow Stick Skeleton” and “Unicorn” (with friends). Jack made for a pretty adorable Yoda but only lasted about half an hour at the party.
Halloween was a different beast for our family this year. As the kids get older and graduate from their trick-or-treating years, it becomes much less “hands on” for mom and dad. Anna went over to a friend’s house, Lily had a bunch of her friends over at ours, Rachel blasted through her friends’ neighborhood trick-or-treating and Tim took Eve and her friend collecting candy in our neighborhood. Jack(Yoda) handed out candy with me at home. It couldn’t have worked out more perfectly.
At the beginning of each art lesson, I ask the students to venture a guess as to where the artist was from, based on the sound of their name. Consequently, they’re learning that many of the “masters” originated in France (and Italy, and the Netherlands). They are also discovering that the French drop the sounds of consonants at the end of their words, that Italian might be the easiest foreign language to pronounce, and that artists from the United States are multi-cultural (as one would expect in a pluralistic culture such as ours).
When I posited the question during this lesson on Grandma Moses, I got my favorite response of all time: “I’m thinking she might have been from Egypt.” After all, Moses was from Egypt. Classic. But no, I had to inform this worthy guesser that Grandma Moses was, in fact, from the United States. Laughed out loud.
Sixth-graders are a great bunch to teach. Most of them have dubbed themselves as either artists or non-artists by this point. So the trick is to reel them in through art history, and/or use a medium with which they have little to no experience so they know they can chalk up any perceived failures to it being their first time. In this lesson, we did both.
First, we read this book. I’m a big fan of Mike Venezia’s series. I especially enjoyed that he mentioned that Grandma Moses’ depictions of the simple life resulted from the lack of availability of modern technology. Like movies, TV, and CD players. No mention of handheld devices. I checked the publication date: 2003. Ancient history by now.
Second, I breezed through this powerpoint, giving a additional background on Grandma Moses, introducing a few art principles (horizon line, foreground, middle ground, and background), and explaining the project step-by-step. Here it is, in a nutshell:
Draw horizon line.
Draw background.
Draw objects in foreground.
Fill in the middle ground.
Wet small brush to blend colors on the smaller objects.
Use larger brush to blend colors of the rest of the landscape.
It worked out well. In the assignment, kids were expected to include objects one might have found in a typical Grandma Moses scene. Trees, fields, people, buildings, animals, a path or stream. It kept them engaged and there was little to no mess, as a bonus.
Materials used: Watercolor pencils, watercolor paper (9X12)
Difficulty: Easy. Sixth-graders were encouraged to take their time. Most used up the full hour and a half they were given. Instruction took about 30 minutes.
